Enabling Mobile Network Managers

Network and system maintenance personnel are increasingly mobile. This creates a potential market for a network, system and service management terminal that is highly mobile, which would supplement existing network and system management solutions. This paper presents a generic architectural solution for this problem based on a highly scalable and network-centric approach to development of network management applications. Although the specific focus is on network management solutions, the results are generally applicable to many other types of applications as well. Some details and experiences from an actual implementation are described, using the Nokia 9000 Communicator and IBM Webbin' CMIP as the enabling technologies. Areas for future research are also explored.